Malachi Ritscher

The Malachi Ritscher Collection represents the work of Chicago sound recordist Malachi Ritscher. Ritscher was a passionate supporter of Chicago's improvised music jazz scene. Although technically an amateur, Mr. Ritscher was well known in Chicago for making meticulous, high fidelity recordings at hundreds of live music events from the mid-1980s (perhaps earlier) until his death in 2006. This collection of recordings, now a part of the Creative Audio Archive, is a unique record of musical development in Chicago during a particularly fertile period, a history that resonates to the present.